This Day in Coast Guard History – Nov. 25

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

1968-M/V Triple Crown foundered off the coast of Southern California with a loss of nine lives while retrieving the anchor and chain of a large offshore drilling rig. At the time of the casualty Triple Crown had eight anchors and 26,000 feet of chain on board, the weight of which caused a low freeboard aft. Three-to five waves washed over the stern and entered a stackhouse door that could not be closed due to the location of one anchor on deck. The engine flooded, the vessel listed to starboard and sank. The Coast Guard investigated.

1999-Elian Gonzalez, a 5-year old Cuban boy, was found on Thanksgiving morning clinging to an inner tube three miles off the coast of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He was among three survivors of a boating catastrophe which killed 11 migrants fleeing Cuba. The Coast Guard searched from Islamorada to Boca Raton, using a HU-25 and a HH-65 from Air Station Miami, a HC-130 from Air Station Clearwater, the CGC Maui, and a 41-foot UTB from Station Fort Lauderdale. The child later gained international notoriety when his father, a Cuban citizen, attempted to have him returned to Cuba, a desire that Elian's relatives in the U.S. fought through the U.S. court system all the way to the Supreme Court. The Court ruled in his father's favor and the child was returned to Cuba.